What hasn’t been looked at until now is the collapse’s impact on record labels, especially indies. CMU reports:

Within the record industry, one topic of debate this week since HMV went into administration on Tuesday has been the impact the collapse of the retailer could have on the labels and distributors, especially in the independent sector where margins are much tighter and a sizable crisis at one big company can take others to the brink too.

There are both short and long-term issues, of course. In the long-term, if the HMV store network was to disappear from the high street completely, or if the HMV chain that emerges from administration is significantly smaller, it will mean the closure of a key channel through which labels have been able to sell to consumers.